Ponzi scheme

Noun

Ponzi scheme (plural Ponzi schemes)

1. A fraudulent scheme where earlier investors are paid with the money taken from new investors, giving the impression that the scheme is a viable investment.
   • Bernard L. Madoff, the one-time senior statesman of Wall Street who in 2008 became the human face of an era of financial misdeeds and missteps for running the largest and possibly most devastating Ponzi scheme in financial history, died on Wednesday at the Federal Medical Center in Butner, N.C. He...2021 April 14, Diana B. Henriques, “Bernard Madoff, Architect of Largest Ponzi Scheme in History, Is Dead at 82”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
   • Now, a long-running Ponzi scheme requires a narrative — and the narrative is where crypto really excels.2021 May 20, Paul Krugman, “Technobabble, Libertarian Derp and Bitcoin”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

   Synonyms:

   Ponzi scam